


Arrest me

by MissesMarvel



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: AirportAU, Alternate Universe - No Powers, Alternate Universe - Police, Alternate Universe - Tattoos, Anal, Anal Fingering, Anal Fisting, Anal Play, Anal Sex, Ass Play, Ass to Mouth, Bisexual Bucky Barnes, Bisexual Male Character, Bisexual Steve Rogers, Bucky Barnes Feels, Canon Bisexual Character, Dirty Jokes, Dirty Talk, Dirty Thoughts, Double Anal Penetration, Drugs, Everyone Is Gay, Gay, Gay Sex, Heroin, Language, M/M, Marvel Universe, MarvelAU, Modern Setting, No vet Bucky, No vet Steve, Police Uniforms, Police officer Steve, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers, References to Drugs, Relationship(s), Rimming, Sharing a Bed, Smoking, Smuggler!Bucky, Stucky - Freeform, Tattoos, Tongues, Vet!Sam, cop!steve, no metal arm
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-06-23
Updated: 2018-03-12
Packaged: 2018-07-16 22:05:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 19,385
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7286452
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissesMarvel/pseuds/MissesMarvel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Summary</p><p>Steve Rogers was tiny, and suffered from asthma – but he was damn good at his job, no matter what. There had never been a cop so honest, modest and keen to do his job right – yet so kind – in the whole NYPD.<br/>Yes. Steve Rogers loved his job.<br/>But ever since he had to join the airport-guard, he felt slightly different about that. Being – more or less -  kicked out of active duty, because of his ‘medical conditions’ was just plain ridiculous. He never had any problems with his health whilst being in the academy. </p><p>Steves moral compass and his loyalty to his oaths gets tested big time, when he meets James. A charming criminal who needs his help.</p><p>It all started on a normal, boring day at work…</p><p>Infos</p><p>AU!2010s-setting: modern language/technology</p><p>AU!Marvel-Characters will appear in the background of this story</p><p>PLOT with porn</p><p>Tags are added (chapter after chapter), as well as new characters and eventual triggers are going to be in the note before the chapter </p><p>As always I am stating, not to be a native speaker and beg you to call me out on grammar/spelling errors asap.</p><p>Have fun.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The airport-incident

**Author's Note:**

> Hey and welcome to this story! 
> 
> I hope you have fun!
> 
> Triggers:  
> \- Explicit Violence: No  
> \- Explicit Sex: No  
> \- Other: Slight (!) racism, language
> 
> Revised: No

Steve shouldn’t be unhappy. Oh no, he had a nice salary, he served his country (at least somehow) and he had good, flexible hours and nice colleagues.   
Life should be good, right?

But Steve was unhappy. 

He had gone through 6 months police academy, 3 years of studying and 2 more years of probation-service – to end up as a shitty airport-guard. 

So hell yeah – he was damn unhappy.

But apparently, his asthma and the fact that he barely scratched 5’’3 and weighed about 100lbs soaking wet, were signs of him being unfit to actual police-duty. Which was bullshit. Steve had graduated from the top of his class, nothing but straight A’s – even in the sports-tests (although it had took him some time to get there). And now that.

He opened the security door with his special keys and entered the staff-room. It was more or less plain white with two posters that – in theory – should be boosting moral. But the little cat that said ‘Hang in there!’ and the ‘Go team!’ poster didn’t really do the job.   
Steve hung his jacket on the inside of his spin and quickly looked around before undressing.   
He wasn’t shy, but – if possible – he tried not undressing himself in front of others. There wasn’t much appeal to his skinny body, it was better to spare them the look. 

It also spared him from the comments. 

He fixed his uniform and took one last look in the mirror, before shutting it close.   
Another day as a security guard. Hurray.

The lights flickered, but it was too dark outside to turn them off. 5am at the New York airport and the halls were already filled with more people than he could count.   
Families flying off to vacation, business-penguins taking their 3rd flight this week and lonely travellers waiting for their next big adventure.  
He breathed in the fresh air, coming through the windows, that got opened automatically every hour.   
The air outside was already heating up from the sun rising and Steve felt the light breeze and the slow energy of people waking up and getting to work. The day was just starting up and he felt incredibly alive.  
Sad, how all of his energy was wasted day by day to control doors, do basic check-ups and guide people through metal detectors.   
He sighted and walked over to his first stop of the day, the gun detectors at gate 8.   
There weren’t that many people at his gate this morning, so he could take it slow and steady – wishing everybody a nice day.   
Steve might not like his job, but he was polite to everybody – regardless of gender or race.

Which was exactly why he hated the fact, that he had to spend the first four hours of his shift with his colleague Johann Schmidt.  
Not only was the guy a blunt sexist – which Steve despised – he also was racist as shit. And he used the little power they had, to make sure every person that wasn’t a white, straight, cis male got reminded of the fact that – in his eyes – they were worth nothing.

At this very moment he was tormenting a young, Turkish woman with a hijab.   
“You hiding something in there?” Schmidt placed a hand on the shoulder of the women. Steve rolled his eyes and walked towards them – hoping Schmidt wouldn’t give that girl enough material to file a lawsuit against them. “No, sir.” He could hear her say with a shaking voice.   
“Then you should let me take a look.”  
“But it didn’t beeped!”  
“Oh are you making the rules now?”  
“No, but it would be against my religion to...”  
“Oh against your religion. Well isn’t it against your religion to blow up airplanes as well? And yet your folks do it – so to prevent that – take off the scarf.”  
Steve hurried up. “Leave her alone, Schmidt!” He said as loud as he could, hoping that the other staff members would hear it. He might be a cop – but Schmidt was bigger than him, like way bigger. And he didn’t gave a fuck – which made him a threat.

“Rogers, don’t you have weapon-duty? This is metal-detector and body-search. So none of your fucking business.”   
Schmidt turned his back at him.  
“This is harassment, Schmidt. Get away from her. Now.”  
“Now would you look at that”, Schmidt turned again, this time with a smirk on his face, “you weren’t good enough to be a cop, so now you play one here? Where do you have the power to tell me what to do?”  
Steve already had a salty answer on his tongue, but a sharp voice behind him cut him off. “He might now have the power to do that, but I sure as hell have. Get away from that woman, or I arrest you for hurting her civil-rights.”

Steve didn’t have to look behind him, to know who spoke. Natasha kicks-your-butt-before-you-even-know-she’s-there Romanov.   
They went to the same academy and served most of their time in university together. 

Schmidt finally backed off and get replaced by Clint Barton – a hard-working, nice guy that had a crush on Natasha ever since she started to pick up Steve for breakfast at 9am – when both of them had their break.  
Natasha was a real cop. But she never abandoned Steve – after he got – more or less – kicked out of duty.   
“Imma gonna go take my break. You okay here?”  
Barton nodded towards Steve and smiled stupidly, when Natasha smirked. 

“Thanks. But I could have handled Schmidt by myself.” His friend looked over to him, “I was just trying to help, Steve. I know that you are a though call – but sadly he was right. I have more power than you – I could’ve actually arrested him.” - “I know.” Steve nodded – although he hated the truth behind this statement – and entered the staff-room with Tasha in his back.   
“What’s gonna happen to him now?”  
Natasha shrugged and looked away, as Steve pulled his shirt over his head. “He will get suspended. But not forever. You know how shit works around here.”  
“Shit”, Steve mumbled behind the door of his locker, “I already got him suspended twice, but he’s always coming back.”

When he was finished changing, they walked down the street to a small diner.  
“Coffee?” The waitress smiled at them and scribbled their answers on a small note pad, together with Natashas order of pancakes and Steves bacon and eggs.   
“She’s pretty.” - “Not interested.” Tasha squinted her eyes at him, but Steve looked unimpressed. 

Their waitress WAS pretty. Blonde, a warm face and not THAT much taller than Steve.

“Is there anyone you are interested in, right now?” He shook his head, “nah, not really. I recognize cute girls – and guys for that matter – but I haven’t had a real crush since...” Steve swallowed dry. Since Peggy.   
He didn’t had to say it, Natasha knew about her. 

Peggy had been this strong, amazing cadet in the academy. She and Steve flirted occasionally – but when Steve finally had the courage to ask her out (and she said yes (of course)) their happiness got crushed by the hard reality of New York.  
Peggy got shot on her first real night shift as a probation-police-woman. 

Natasha hated the memory of that.

Steve nearly had a breakdown, which lead to a hardcore asthma-attack. Their supervisor saw it and took him off the program right after the graduation. 

The waitress broke the silence in between them by bringing them their food.

“What about you?” Steve asked before digging into his bacon. “Meh, a couple of guys are kinda nice I guess – but none of them is really interesting.” - “Not even Clint?” She nearly chocked – well hidden, but Steve saw it. “Your colleague?” - “Oh cut the crap you know EXACTLY who I am talking about.” She got a little red on her cheeks and Steve grinned. “What?” - “I just got my answer. Shall I hook you two up?” - “Fuck you. I can take care of stuff like that myself.” 

The waitress came back and Natasha paid, Steve had paid last time.   
Steve had to focus real hard not to blush, as she slipped the bill over to him. ‘Shannon ♥ - 12098273645’ stood right above the logo of the diner, in light blue ink.

“Call her. She seems nice.” Natasha took her jacket and walked out, Steve followed her. On his way out, he threw the recipe in the trash.

 

“How was your break?” Clint seemed disappointed, that Natasha hadn’t come in with Steve again. “It was nice. Natasha likes you, you two should go out!” Clint got bride red in the matter of seconds. “Wh..what?” He stuttered. “Her shift on Friday ends at 6pm, pick her up at the NYPD on second street. She likes roses – but not the red or the pink ones, do NOT get her orchids, she’s allergic to those and if you want to impress her – take her to an Italian or Japanese restaurant. Sushi is her favourite!”

He winked at Clint and took off. Second half of his shift was drug control.  
Steve smiled at everyone coming towards him, making his way to his gate for the day. 

He hated drug control.   
Looking into bags, sniffing around like a dog – taking out stoners and on lucky days some eastern Asians trying to smuggle turtle-shells or dog penises.   
It was pretty boring.

He checked the bags of some students coming from Amsterdam – ignoring the 10 gram of weed that were hidden in the toothbrush case. When he first started this job, he got exited when he could take someone out. But by now, he had realized that prisons were filled and all the kids he sold out got, was a slick on the wrist and a call to their parents.

There was no need to report them.

“All clear!” He shouted and gave the suit-cases a push to roll out of the room.  
The students looked at him with huge eyes as he smiled and nodded towards them.

“Yo Rogers, we might have a big fish here.” Tony Stark, supervisor of the technical and the drug departments stuck his head through the door and smiled at him.   
He basically owned the airport, but he still helped out where he could.

“I’ll send him in, you ready?” Steve nodded, it didn’t happen every day that he got someone in for questioning.   
Steve wondered what this was about.

A tall, fit looking, handsome man got into the room and smirked at him. He was that kind of handsome that could make you cry out of pure frustration.  
‘Please don’t smuggle dog penises’, Steve thought to himself.   
“Hey, I’m Steve.” He offered his hand. The subject eyeballed him from head to toes and then decided to shake the offered hand. “James, James Barnes.”  
Steve felt weird.   
“So should I just undress myself or something?”  
“What?”  
Steve felt the heat risen up in his cheeks.  
“Aren’t you the body check dude?”  
Ahhhhhh, Steve shook his head and suppressed a smile.  
“God no, I’m the questioning-dude. To be precise, I am the bag-searching guy, but every once in a while I get to question someone.”  
“So no body check by you? Pity.” James shrugged and Steves mouth dropped open. He did not just say that.  
“Take a seat, we’ll see how this ends.”  
WHY WAS HE FLIRTING WITH HIM? This guy probably was a smuggler and had a bag full of illegal substances up his cute butt.   
His butt.  
Scratch the cute.

But it was a cute butt.  
Shit.  
Rogers.  
FOCUS.

James smirked again and sat himself down on the opposite side of the table.   
“Why are you in here? Someone found something? You said something stupid?”  
James shrugged again. I guess I really did something stupid. Not sure if it was illegal though.”  
“Tell me.” Steve saw James licking and then biting his bottom lip. That guy was nervous as shit. But damn that mouth.

This man was through and through pretty.  
Dark hair, not too long but long enough to get styled to stand up – slightly curly. Smooth, light skin, smashing brown eyes with lashes that every drag queen in New York would be jealous about and this goddamn mouth.

“You know this paper you have to fill out? With all those crazy ass questions on it? Like ‘Are you a terrorist? Yes? No?’.”  
Oh god. Steve hated the direction this was heading.  
Every couple months he got to talk to a kid or two that thought it would be funny to check the drug box on that stupid paper.   
But this guy was way to old to be that stupid.  
Right?

“I checked the drug box because I wanted to know what was going to happen...”

Oh dear lord.

Steve took a deep breath. “Mr. Barnes. May I ask how old you are?” - “26...” - “So you are telling me you checked that box. You. A fully grown man.” - “Yeah… I know. Kinda stupid.” - “Kinda?” - “Okay yeah. That was stupid. I get it. Am I good to go?” 

Steve sighted. “Yeah sure, sign here and you can go. Just don’t check that box again.” - “Got it.” The brunet smiled. 

“You sure you don’t want to do that body check?”  
“Get outta here!” He laughed and shut the door behind James.

Sadness crawled up Steves sleeve, but he couldn’t understand why. He knew him since a couple of minutes – and yet he felt some kind of connection to him.  
And now he would never see him again.


	2. The no-flight-list

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter got WAY too long - but I completely lost track of that and now it's done :D

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Triggers:  
> \- Explicit Violence: No  
> \- Explicit Sex: Yes (!!!)  
> \- Other: mild drug-references, language
> 
> Revised: No

Steve finished around 2pm and walked out the front door, looking forward to catch some sunlight. He waved Tony goodbye and smiled at the city in front of him. New York was buzzing in the summer heat and Steve was ready to dive in.   
His car stood next to the garage.

Halfway on his way he recognized a face, sitting in a small piece of shadow, his back leaning to the glass of the airport-wall. 

He shouldn’t.

He really, really shouldn’t.

“Hey, James – right?”  
The other man seemed surprised, but happy. “Hey, yeah! Not-body-check-guy.” - “It’s Steve, actually. What are you still doing here?” James blinked in the sunlight and his glowing eyes melted Steves heart.   
Was being that pretty even legal?  
“I’m stuck. Turns out that my little experiment got me on the no-flight-list until Monday.” - “Oh shit. You got some place to stay?” He shook his head. “They won’t give me my money or my passport – I can, quote ‘pick them up Monday’. Your co-workers are very nice, I must say. Sucks that I know no one in New York. But I’m gonna be fine. At least it’s warm.”   
He smiled again, expecting Steve to say goodbye and leave.   
“Well now you know someone in New York. C’mon.” Steve offered James a hand to get up. “You can crush at my place... CRASH at my place.” - “Man”, James took his hand and got on his feet, “that’s real nice and I appreciate it. But I can’t take that offer. You know nothing ‘bout me – I know nothing ‘bout you...” Steve cut him off. “Yeah yeah, you want a pinky promise that I’m not a serial killer? It’s Friday and you have a whole weekend ahead – I can’t watch you spend it on the streets.”

James hesitated, but he followed Steve to his car.   
“It’s Bucky, btw.”  
“Huh?”  
“People – friends of mine – call me Bucky.”  
Steve smiled, “tell me Bucky, why are you in NYC when you know nobody here?” - “I had to take a stop here, my plane-route didn’t fly from A to B in one go. Started in Ohio – got family there – on my way to New Mexico.”  
“Got family there, too?” Steve almost immediately apologized for being so nosy.   
“Nah, business. I fly this route a couple times a year. That’s why it felt kinda safe to check the box. I thought it wouldn’t be that big of a dead and well – I’ve been curious for some time now.”  
Steve felt Buckys eyes on him. “What about you? How does someone end up as a bag-and-not-body-checker in an airport?” Steve shrugged. “I graduated from police-academy about half a year ago”, Bucky snickered, “you? A cop? You are the smallest guy I’ve ever seen.” - “Fuck you, too. As I was saying, I graduated – but a ~personal~ tragedy threw me back a bit and my supervisor used that to send me here. Years of work and straight A’s and now I’m a better bouncer.” He didn’t knew why he trusted Bucky with that story. It felt kinda weird telling his problems to a stranger, but also good.

“Sucks.” Bucky mumbled, “but hey, at least you got a safe job, right?” - “That’s true. What do you do?” The man riding shotgun seemed to think a little too long about that question, before answering. “I’m in trade-market.” Steves eyebrows rose, “trade-market.” - “Yeah, more or less. Long story.”  
He slowed his car down and pulled over, “We gotta walk the last block – can’t park in front of my apartment-house.” Bucky shrugged and unbuckled his seat-belt. 

“What floor?”  
“Bucky pressed the elevator button. “4. It’s nothing fancy but it’s enough.” - “Sounds good to me. You live alone?” - “Yeah, ever since my ma died.” - “Sorry man, I know the feeling.” Steve looked over to Bucky and smiled sadly.   
“That’s it. Make yourself at home! Bathroom’s over there, towels are in the cupboard to the left – you look like you could use a shower. You got some clothes in that bag of yours?” Bucky nodded, “great. Everything in the fridge is free for you to eat, but I gotta go get groceries for the weekend later. Now go get yourself cleaned up – I’m going to set up the couch for ya.”  
He left Bucky standing in the door, a little overwhelmed by the situation, to get to the kitchen. His apartment had two rooms, one main-living-room, kitchen and bathroom to the left, his bedroom to the right.  
The sound of running water calmed him down. Bucky took a shower – which meant he had a couple minutes to get a grasp of the situation. 

A hot, but kind of stupid, guy – that had been flirting with him – was going to live with him for 3 days.  
How the hell was he going to survive this?

He took a look in the fridge and almost got himself a beer – almost. It was 3pm on a Friday and he had to go to the supermarket before his weekend officially started.  
Grabbing a pen, Steve sat down and started making a list. Beer, milk, toast, tomatoes, Bucky in a towel, chocolate… wait what?  
Bucky stood in the door with a towel around his hips and a smile on his face. Water dripping down from his dark hair, forming trails – racing with each other downwards to his perfect not-too-strong abs and damn – Steve wished he could follow them with his fingers.

What.

Ehm.

He cleared his throat. “Hey you finished, that’s good! You want something special to eat – or do you have allergies or something?” James shook his head and walked over to Steve, to take a look at his list. “You want me to come with you later?” - “Hmm sounds good. Whenever I go alone I have to drive there to get everything to my flat in one go.” 

Steve (quite literally) had a hard time, trying not to focus on the fact that Buckys lower half – covered, only with a towel – was right next to his face. 

“I’m gonna go get dressed, we can go right after that. Pretty sure I don’t want to see supermarkets in New York on a Friday evening at rush hour.”  
“Oh yeah, that’s terrible. Dress lightly – it’s over 90°F outside!” - “Oh god. I’m gonna melt into a puddle. Good thing that you have AC in here.”

Steve waited until Bucky was dressed and grabbed his keys, a backpack and some money before leaving the flat, with his new friend right behind him.  
“You think that’s hot? Isn’t New Mexico worse?” Bucky shrugged, “I spend most of my time in Ohio. Toledo to be precise – the weather is pretty fair there. But yeah, New Mexico is awful. I am not made for heat.” - “So you come from Toledo huh? Never been there, how is it?” Bucky laughed, “to be honest, I hate it. I was born right here in Brooklyn – we moved when I was about 8 and I never got used to it.”   
Steve laughed too, “I feel you. I was born here as well, we almost moved due to money twice – but somehow we always managed to stay.”

Silence fell over the two of them, as they made their way to the store. The cool air inside made Steve moan lightly, “thank god. This is so nice. Fuck my apartment – let’s just stay in here.” Bucky got the shopping cart and patted Steves back. “C’mon Steve, let’s get this over with.” - “But it’s so nice and cold in here.” - “Yeah, but in about half an hour this store will be pretty packed.” Steve mumbled something under his breath and followed Bucky around. 

About 10 minutes later they checked out and walked back to Steves place – packing away the groceries – leaving both of them in a puddle of sweat.  
“Shower number two?” Steve mocked Bucky, as they sat at the table and the brunet swiped away the sweat-pearls on his forehead. “After you”, he replied and grinned.   
“You wanna do something in New York, while you’re here?” Steve asked, heading to the fridge to – finally – get his beer. “Nah, I’ve been here before. Been thinking of moving here but… money is tights and Brooklyn is expensive.” Thankfully he took the beer, Steve offered and started at it.   
“Can I ask you something?”   
Steve hummed approving.  
“Why are you helping me?”

Steve gave himself a couple seconds to think, whilst taking a big sip off his bottle. “I think you are a nice guy, who made a mistake – a really stupid one by the way – but I won’t let someone like you sleep on the streets for 3 days. That’s just not who I am.”   
“I don’t know how to thank you for that, Steve. You are the first person to be that nice to me, since quite some time.”   
Steve didn’t asked about that.  
He was pretty sure Bucky didn’t want to deepen the information he just gave away.  
“I am glad that I can help you out. But I don’t think you will be that thankful tomorrow morning, my couch is shitty to sleep on.”  
They laughed and talked about their childhoods in Brooklyn. 

“How late is it?” Steve leaned over and tried getting his handy out of his back-pocket. “Holy crap – it’s already 6pm. How did that happen? You hungry?” Bucky made a grimace and nodded heavily, “sounds good.”  
Steve pulled himself up and walked towards his cupboards. “Can I help?” He froze. Bucky was standing right behind him.   
He smelled so good.

God, was he developing a crush on this guy?

“Sure, you can chop up those tomatoes in even slices and grade the cheese in the fridge.” Steve held his breath until Bucky moved.  
Shit.  
He totally did develop a crush on him.  
Shit.  
Shit.  
Shit.

Trying to get his mind off the picture of Bucky in a towel, he sliced up some potatoes.  
‘Do not get hard over a guy that is standing less than 5 yards from you’, his brain reminded him of the obvious.   
Steve put the potatoes in a buttered form, poured some cream over them and topped it up with the tomatoes and the grated cheese.   
“It’s going to take about an hour in the oven – I’m gonna jump in the shower. Feel free to watch TV or something.”  
As he closed the bathroom-door behind him he felt immediate relief. And an immediate hard on, pressing against his leg.   
Bucky had a horrible effect on him – why exactly he had this effect? Steve didn’t had a clue. 

He thought about taking an icy shower to get rid of it – but even at 90°F outside – he still hated cold water and there were different ways to get rid of a boner.  
Soaking his body in soap, he suppressed a moan as he stroke himself – twitching the sensitive skin under his hands lightly, to get that nice, light pain he was a sucker for. His mind gave the picture of the dripping, hot, wet Bucky from earlier free and Steve felt the heat rising up – giving him shivers under the hot ass water.  
He let one hand wander off to his asshole, to clean it up and sink a finger in it – heating up his lust big time.   
If only he could bring up the courage to start flirting with Bucky again – there was a chance the other man only did that to escape his shitty situation or to be witty – but maybe, just maybe, he actually WAS gay and actually liked what he saw, looking at Steve.

Steve hated the way his body looked, but he discovered earlier in his life that for some people, especially some gay/pan/poly/demi/bi/whatever guys, his body seemed appealing.  
God he wished for Bucky to be that kind of guy.  
He would be such a nice boy for Bucky, would let him open him up real slow and let go under his hands – or he would fuck into him just the way the other man wanted to. No matter what Bucky was into – Steve would die to give it to him.

He felt his legs weaken, as he imagined all the dirty things we would do to him.  
All the dirty, dirty things he would whisper in his ears.  
Before Steve could finish this thought, his legs began to shake and his body pumped hot cum at the shower-wall. 

His cheeks hot red and hot right after he came – the feeling of shame overwhelmed him. What on earth was he thinking? Jacking off to some guy he just met – he didn’t knew anything about.   
Shampooing his hair as quickly as possible, he finished up his shower and wrapped a towel around his tiny waist. 

Steve opened the bathroom-door and enjoyed the steam coming off his skin as the hot water met the cool air from the living room.   
“You’re smoking.” Bucky joked, standing in the doorway to Steves bedroom. “That’s just the natural reaction whenever I take my shirt off. I’m too hot for this world.” He laughed and ruffled through his soaking blond hair. “Were you in my bedroom?” - “Yeah”, Bucky looked concerned, “I hope that’s okay.” Steve shrugged, “sure.” - “You didn’t told me that you are an artist.”   
The blonde walked over to Bucky and smiled warm, “everybody needs a hobby.” He stood in the middle of his bedroom and looked to Bucky. 

There was an awkward silence in between them.

“Can you… like… go… or something? I want to...”, Steve gestured towards his closet and Bucky straightened up immediately. “Oh shit, sure, sorry. I’m an idiot sometimes.” He walked out and closed the door behind him.   
Steve took a deep breath and looked around. There were just three of his own paintings in here, all of them landscapes – and the one he was working on right now. Natasha in her uniform, smiling and waving at the viewer.  
Good that Bucky didn’t see his sketchbooks. The drawings in there were definitely not save for work and it would have been extremely embarrassing if someone else ever were to see them.   
He put on his favourite sweatpants and a loose shirt and opened the door to join Bucky in the living room – BAD timing.

Bucky was bowed over, scraping his pants from his legs – looking over to Steve with horror on his face.   
“Sorry man...”  
“I was just changing into something more comfy.”  
“I’ll just”, Steve was bride red and he knew it, “I’ll just go in the kitchen. Sorry. I’m… I’m gonna go. Call if you’re finished.”

Oh god. 

This was terrible.  
Why.  
Why him.  
Shit like this always happened to him.

A thousand thoughts rushed through his head – one of them dominated quickly: ‘Damn these thighs!’   
Bucky had amazing thighs. From the quick look Steve had gotten on them, he still had been able to see all the muscle-strings lying under the skin. 

These were no normal thighs.   
These were the thighs of betrayal.

He felt stupid, thinking about Bucky like that – already getting hard again (AGAIN. IT HAD BEEN 10 MINUTES SINCE THE SHOWER GOD-DAMN).  
“Finished.” Steve jumped up as Bucky entered the kitchen. “Great, sorry again for walking in on you.” - “No harm done. Not like I was naked or something – it was just a little weird posture for you to catch me in.”

The posture wasn’t weird.  
It was damn nice.

FOCUS STEVE.

He smiled awkwardly and nodded, “yeah, still. Catching people changing is always a weird thing.” The other man nodded, “tell me ‘bout it. My last boyfriend”, Steve chocked lightly, “used to change in the bathroom – even after being together for half a year.”   
“Hmhm”, Steve tried not to think too hard about what Bucky just said. It was normal to be gay or pan or bi – that didn’t mean ANYTHING. That did not mean that Steve had any more of a chance than before.   
God, his thoughts were horrible right now.

“Yeah, okay THAT’S weird”, he joked and bit his tongue to keep himself from smiling too obvious. “Agree. He was weird. How ‘bout you? If your painting keeps up with the real one – your girlfriend looks amazing!”   
What?  
“What?”  
“The girl from your painting?”   
Ahhhh.  
“Oh no, that’s Natasha. She’s amazing, but we’re only friends. I know her since the first day of police academy.” - “Oh, sorry.” - “Nah, I get how you could think that.” - “So you’re single?” Steve had to force his tongue from slipping a sexy-witty answer. “Yeah, you?” - “Hmhm.” 

The climate in the kitchen became extremely stiff and awkward.

“Can I ask you another question?” Bucky blatantly looked at Steve, who stood there – not knowing what to do with his hands. “Sure.” - “Sorry if this is too direct, I don’t want to make this weird since I’m crashing here till Monday, but… we kind of flirted this morning, right?” - “I am horrible at flirting, but yeah, kinda.” Steve swallowed dry. 

This was going in a GREAT direction.

“So”, Bucky continued, “you’re single, I’m single, we’re both into dudes – I’m bisexual, no idea what you are – and we have a weekend to spend.”  
Steve just stood there.  
“Jep. I made it weird. Okay never mind, sor-” - “I’m bisexual, too.”  
This whole situation was very stupid and weird, but also hot as fuck.  
“You-” - “We-” - “Sorry I-” - “You tal-” - “Shit sorry. You talk first.”

What even.

Steve took a deep breath. “What I was saying is, I don’t think you make this weird. I just think that it looks like I just took you with me to fuck you and I don’t want you to think that.” Great.   
Bucky snorted and said scoffing, “you didn’t? I totally thought that. God, good to know that I am not the only one over thinking everything.” - “So… what do we do now… with this ~situation~?”   
Bucky still looked over to him.  
“I am going to do, what I should have done in the first place.”  
Before Steve could think about that, the brunet came closer, pulled Steve upwards and kissed him. Deep.   
There was nothing better than kissing someone new for the first time, knowing that it wouldn’t be the last time – at least for some time.   
He gasped for air, leaving his mouth open for Bucky to explore with his tongue, tasting the bitter-sweet flavour he had smelled earlier – just a thousand times more intensive. Bucky lifted him up to the counter to minimize the height difference – he was at least 6 feet tall, leaving 8 inches between them. But damn, Steve was a sucker for high differences. There was nothing better, than being pinned against a wall, levitating, being held in place only by the other persons body.

He was rock hard.

And so was Bucky.

Was this happening?

Steves hands clawed themselves into Buckys thick hair, he guided his mouth off Buckys and sucked, kissed, bit - ~discovered~ the neck in front of him. It tasted like sweat and warm, sun-tanned skin.   
Bucky sighted right in Steves ear and send shivers down his spine. “You are so fucking small.” - “Yeah, I noticed that.” Steve got back to kissing the other man’s neck and Bucky laughed quietly. “So small, so precious, so skinny – I’m gonna tear you apart so nicely...” Steve moaned so loud into his kisses, he surprised himself with it.  
“Not a fan of dirty talk?”  
“Oh don’t you dare shut up now.”  
Steve could feel Bucky grin, as he worked himself down, as good as he could, almost ripping the shirt of the brunet – trying to get it off him. As he felt the chest under his fingers, his whole world crashed for a moment.

How, just how could someone be that perfect.

“Steve? Are you breathing?”  
“I want to draw you so damn badly.”  
“We are hardcore making out and you want to DRAW me?”  
“Fuck yes.”  
Bucky threw himself in a pose. “Draw me like one of your French girls.” Steve stared at him. “Shut the fuck up and come over here, or else I WILL draw you and this shit will take hours and I hardly believe that either one of us could take that.”   
Bucky smirked so dirty, all Steve wanted was to turn this smirk into an expression of lust – and he knew he was gonna get his will.   
He felt Buckys hands slowly rising up his waist, taking his shirt with them, pulling it over his head.

When the shirt stopped blocking the view in between them – they just stared at each other for a moment. 

Buckys lips crashed against Steves oh so light skin and caused the delightfully pleasurable pain of a forming hickey on his chest.   
The blonde sucked in the air – hard. Bucky pulled away, surprised by Steves strong reaction, an almost illegal look forming on his face. “Oh you’re into that, huh? Small Stevie from Brooklyn is into a little pain in the bedroom. Why am I even surprised?”   
Steve gasped for air, “we’re in the kitchen.” - “What?” - “You said in the bedroom, but technically we are in the kitchen, so...” Bucky snorted and headed back to Steves alabaster skin to get more bruises on him – like an artist getting paint on a fresh canvas.

The younger one clawed his fingernails into Buckys back and scratched hard enough to almost draw blood, causing the brunet to inhale sharply, pressing his crotch against the counter.   
“You drive me crazy, you know that?”  
“I literally just jacked off in the shower to you – so I think I win this round.”  
“What if I told you, so did I?”  
“That’s disgusting.”  
“You just said that you did that.”  
“It’s MY freaking shower!”  
“If you gonna complain about my cum in your drains, you are NOT gonna like what I’m planning to do with you.”  
“Don’t be so sure about that.”  
Steve bit his lips and rocked his hips – hoping to cause some rubbing-motion to relive his from the most painful boner he ever had in his life.   
Just the raw thought of Bucky touching himself thinking about him.  
God.  
GOD.

Bucky did not help at all.  
He was sunken into Steves skin, smelling, licking, kissing, bruising him – twitching Steves nipples with his teeth.  
Steve drove his hands from Bucks neck downwards over his spine to his lower back, trying to get under the belt to get a handful of Buckys butt.  
A thought rushed into Steves brain.  
He was gonna get a closer look on the thighs of betrayal.  
CHECK MATE.  
HELL YEAH.  
The firm grip of Buckys behind took him back to reality – that boy was legit fit!  
Both of them panted when Steve sunk his fingers into the firm flesh and Bucky bit into Steves shoulder as a response. He also backed off to open his belt and let down his pants to his ankles.   
Oh damn.  
OH DAMN.  
Steve had a hard time breathing. “You cock is damn pretty, you know that?” He whispered under his breath. “Yeah”, Bucky grinned, “I’ve heard.” He simply pulled down Steves sweatpants and the simple, black boxers right with them – wasting no time. 

All of a sudden he went quiet and backed off again.   
“Steve, are you consenting to having sex with me?”  
Steve looked at him, rising his brows. “Yes.” He said, slowly grasping the situation. He*d never been asked that so formal – but it was kinda nice. Knowing that someone didn’t want to do something he wasn’t cool with it. 

[CONSENT IS IMPORTANT. SORRY. BUT I JUST WANTED THAT TO BE CLEAR. STAY SAFE PEOPLE. #DONT_BE_LIKE_BROCK_TURNER]

Break was over and Bucky was back on Steves skin, kissing himself down – to Steves disappointment – completely ignoring his aching cock. But oh, his aim wasn’t that bad after all.   
He felt Buckys tongue drawing circles around his butthole, spreading him open with one hand.   
“Fuck. You have lube and a condom?” The breath of him speaking against the most sensitive skin of his body paralysed Steve for a second. “in my night stand – I think.” Bucky laughed at the sight of Steves completely blank face. “Okay I’m gonna go look for some – I definitely have some condoms in my bag.”   
Steve nodded.  
Pushing himself off the counter with shaking limbs, going after Bucky, stopping halfway through the living room to get to Buckys bag.

When Bucky came back from Steves bedroom with the things he had searched for – he froze.   
Steve sat on the couch.  
Two bags of heroin – a pound each (at least) – sitting in front of him on the coffee table. 

“Shit”, Bucky whispered, “let me explain, okay?”

Steve just sat there, observing him with his baby blue eyes.

“I… I swear I am not who you think you are...”  
“So you are not a drug dealer?”

Bucky exhaled and his shoulders sank down.  
He still looked absolutely mouth watering, but Steve didn’t allow himself to think about that for now.

“So you actually DO smuggle drugs.” It was more of a statement, rather than a question. Bucky looked devastated and Steve was pretty sure that he thought, he would sell him out to the cops in no time.

Actually, Steve was surprised by himself for staying that calm, not calling Natasha and instead saying: “You smuggled drugs AND CHECKED THE FREAKING BOX ON THE PAPER? How stupid can a person be?”  
It sounded ridiculous but he didn’t gave half a shit about Bucky being a criminal – what he did care about was the sole fact that he was such a dumb-ass-criminal. 

Bucky tilted his head.

“You didn’t double check though.”  
“What?”  
“You just assumed I was some idiot, instead of a smuggler didn’t you.”  
“Omg… that’s genius. Except for the part where you get put on the no-flight-list.” That sounded sassier than he indented it to sound.   
“Yeah I didn’t quite think this through.”

Steve shook his head. “I can’t believe it.”  
“I swear I am NOT using!”  
“Oh I know that.” The confused look on Buckys face almost made him laugh.   
“I am a trained cop and you sir, have no marks on your arms, no dilated pupils – except for now, but you’re aroused that’s perfectly normal, and none of the other signs like shaking, not being able to think logically etc.”   
“You don’t sound mad. Why do you not sound mad?”  
“I am not mad. I just don’t understand it – you are an amazing person, by what I got to see today. Funny, smart, witty, sexy as fuck, fit – how in seven hells did you end up as a smuggler.”

Bucky bowed his head and sat down next to Steve.   
“My dad was an asshole, moved us to Ohio, spending all we had left to vanish not even two months later – leaving me and my mom with nothing. She worked her ass off, but it was never enough. So when I was 15, I searched for jobs and this guy offered me too much money to ask many questions. All I had to do was taking the bus across the state with a backpack I was not allowed to open. Took me about 6 moths to open it anyways and actually get what I was doing, but it kept us over the water – so I stayed. When I turned 18 I became a full member, they taught me how to get through security, to hide stuff. I nearly got caught about a year ago, when I started transferring shit to New Mexico every couple months. I’ve always wanted to quit but never so badly. My boss, he… he told me he would do things to my mom… so I couldn’t get out. I can’t get out.”

Steves mouth dropped open.

“Shit, man. I’m so sorry ’bout that. What’s the cartels name?” Bucky shrugged, “no idea. I get little to no information so that I can’t tell anyone when I get caught. But I know my bosses name – Rumlow. Brock Rumlow.” - “Okay”, Steve lay his hand on Buckys arm. “I know people at the NYPD that can help here. Finding out information about him is probably going to be easy – is that okay with you?”   
The still completely naked Bucky shrugged, “why are you asking me?” - “Because it’s your mother that’s at stake if shit goes down.” - “She’s with Rumlow this very fucking second. There ain’t no way she can be in any more risk than she already is.”

Steve took a long look at Bucky, slowly nodding. “Okay, I’ll call her, but she won’t be in town till Sunday so we have some time on our hands. How are you feeling? Do you wanna sleep a little or-” He didn’t even got to finish his sentence, Bucky was already back cupping his mouth with his own and Steve couldn’t help but laugh.  
That was not what he expected after their talk but damn, he was more than okay with that.  
“Not here...”, he panted in Buckys mouth and almost laughed again at his confused face.

Bucky stood up, gesturing towards the bedroom but Steve shook his head again. “Kitchen”, he said under his breath and the sexy smirk on Buckys face had a comeback. “Damn...”, Bucky whispered, lifting Steve up, carrying to the kitchen – back on to the counter. Both of them already had regained the (little) hardness they had lost over their talk.  
“You are such a horrible cop”, the brunet spread Steves bony legs and talked to the light skin in front of him, rather than the human being.   
Steve hissed out at the feeling of hot air against him. “Such a bad, bad cop. I bet you’ve done more shit than most of the druggies you detect at that airport. I bet real deep down, you are a naughty boy and not the moral guy, keen to solve crimes.” The blonde whimpered as he felt Buckys tongue back on his crack – searching for the pink hole.   
Sadly, Bucky rimming inside Steve, meant that he had to shut up. 

He felt the tongue sliding inside of him, causing his whole body to shake and his hips to rock up. Bucky reached out and held down Steves legs with his hands – drawing circles on the inside of Steves thighs with his thumbs.   
When the older man felt the ring-muscle relax, he removed one of his hands to slide one of his fingers inside Steve. He smiled mildly, when the disappointed scuff turned into a surprised, small scream. 

The lube found it’s way back into his hands and he squeezed some of it into his hands first, to make sure it was at body-temperature, before he dug two of his fingers inside Steves asshole at once – leading the smaller one to a second scream.  
Bucky grinned, searching for the prostate – if Steve was screaming now, how on earth would he react to that?  
The answer to that question was found pretty fast. Hitting the sweet spot with his two fingers, Bucky watched absolutely fascinated, how Steve nearly fell down the counter, contracting every muscle in his body, trying to curl himself up.  
“Stop playing with me! I’m damn close already and I don’t want to miss out on the real fun!” Steve almost shouted, having no control over himself anymore.   
“Ai, ai captain”, Bucky laughed and added a third finger, making sure Steve was loose enough to take all of him. Pleased to see that he most definitely was, Bucky warmed up another squirt of lube, put on a condom and smeared the liquid around Steves entrance and on his own erection.   
As he entered, his face turned white and he moaned against Steves skin in front of him, pushing the blonde further on the counter, feeling Steves fingernails digging into his back again – this time deeper.   
He felt a drop of blood tracing his way down his back, but he didn’t gave half a shit. He looked up, seeing Steves face – eyes closed, mouth slightly opened with a frowned forehead and his head rolled back as far as he could – it was a damn nice picture. Bucky pushed a little more and finally fit all of himself into Steve – reaching up to the blondes face for a kiss.   
“You okay?”  
“Fuck… yes...” Steve panted and had a hard time catching his breath.   
“You look so damn nice Stevie, with your head rolled back taking all of me at once. Can you moan for me, so sweet and nice, like you are?”   
Steve grinned and opened his eyes, “5 minutes ago I was a bad, bad boy and now I’m nice and sweet?”  
“You are horrible at dirty talk”, Bucky grunted and pulled out a little, to fuck deeper inside of Steve as a punishment.

Well.  
It wasn’t really that much of a punishment.

Steves eyes were still open, looking at Bucky with his mouth formed to a perfect O-shape, as he tried processing everything that was going on in his body right now.   
Separating the pain and the pleasure.  
At least as far as that was possible.  
Bucky repeated his motion, going slow, trying not to come immediately because of Steves pure tightness and his face – his god damn perfect face.  
The O vanished from Steves face and turned into a grin, “you are biting your lip like crazy.” - “Yeah, you ~do~ drive me crazy, indeed.” All Bucky wanted right now is to get that O back on Steves face.  
He repositioned himself a little and pushed a finger inside of Steve, next to his cock already sliding forwards and backwards on a slow rate.  
Steves face was priceless – but oh it got so much better, once Bucky found the prostate again, pushing against it with his finger – whilst hardening and speeding up his thrusts – fucking deeper and deeper, harder, faster – until his brain gave up and his instincts just completely took over.  
Steve had broken out into endless moaning, swearing, calling out Buckys name, whispering it, crying it out, screaming.  
It was pure music in Buckys ears.  
The secret to good dirty talk was not giving a damn and letting go of all morals. And Steve had a lot of morals – good thing that all of them were gone now.  
Throwing themselves out the window with every thrust Bucky did.  
“Fuck me Bucky, oh god I swear to god, I’m gonna come real nice for you – just don’t stop. Oh lord deeper, please, yes give it to me…”  
It could have been hilarious, if it wouldn’t be so damn sexy.  
It was one of those moments that you despise in porn, but can’t even grasp in real life.

He bit himself into Steves neck one more time, before shooting his hot load of cum into the condom – nearly crying out loud as Steves ass tightened up and contracted around his over-sensitive dick. He watched Steves cum drizzle down on his own stomach and pulled out – hardly breathing.

It took them about two full minutes to get halfway back on track. “Shower.” Steve moved, careful not to spill cum everywhere, towards the bathroom. He waited until Bucky stood next to him in the shower, before he turned on the cool water – leaving both of them shrieking – but washing away all the sweat and cum on them.

Steve already was back to his usual sass-level, as he stood in front of his mirror, reaching up his neck and looking over to Bucky still drying himself. “What have you done to my neck, man. Are you a fucking vampire?”  
Bucky grinned and showed his teeth, “why? You into that?”  
They returned to the kitchen, where Bucky watched Steve cleaning every inch of ~the~ counter at least twice.  
“This is so disgusting, if you think about it.”  
Bucky shrugged, “it was your idea, buddy.”  
Steve turned around and placed his hands in his hips, “first of all, don’t fucking buddy me, and second off-” Bucky just pulled him into a kiss and smiled.   
“Can you move the heroine to the bedroom? Sam wants to come tomorrow and he has a key – I’m pretty sure we’re awake by that but just in case he gets here early-” - “Will do.” Bucky walked out the kitchen and placed the two packages on the night stand. “Who’s Sam?” He asked.   
“Old friend of mine”, Steve entered the bedroom and threw himself on his bed. “We went to the academy together but he made his police-psychological-paper to help people with ptsd instead of staying a cop. Gunshots and shit freak him out, he served 3 years oversea.” Bucky frowned, “life can fuck you up real bad. Good for him that he makes the best out of his situation.” Steve had already closed his eyes, but he nodded, “you two are gonna like each other.”

Bucky felt weird standing there. So he rubbed his hands on his thighs and backed off the room, “I’m gonna go on the couch, you look tired.”

Opening his eyes, Steve pushed himself up and looked at Bucky. “Are you shitting me right now? No way in hell you’re gonna sleep on the couch. Move your ass in the bed – and get the lights please.”


	3. Drugs for breakfast

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A little shorter.  
> PLOT.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Triggers:  
> \- Explicit Violence: -  
> \- Explicit Sex: -  
> \- Other: Drug-talk, murdering-talk, foreshadowing
> 
> Revised: No

Sleeping in the summer, even without sheets and full on naked, was shitty as fuck. No matter what, one usually woke up covered in sweat and completely miserable, in the urgent need of hydration.  
Steve opened one eye, blinked with it, closed it again and opened the other one. “Steve?” He grumbled tiredly and tried looking around without actually moving his body. Bucky lay next to him, arms and legs spread apart like a starfish, his head tilted to look over to Steve. “You awake?”   
Sight.  
“Hmhm. Moa oa less”, he answered into the blanket under him.  
“It is so warm...”

Silence.

“Hoa lae i i?”  
“What?”  
Steve lifted his head off the bed and repeated: “How late is it?”  
“No idea.”

One of their stomachs growled loudly. “Was that yours or mine?”  
“No idea.”

Bot of them were completely done with the world, laying there, too lazy to move. “We should shower.” - “Yeah.” - “And get breakfast.” - “Yeah.” - “I’m so hungry.” - “Well we got this...” Bucky waved towards the heroine on the night stand. “Great so what? We gonna have drugs for breakfast?” - “If that means we don’t have to stand up, I’m okay with that.” 

A fly appeared and summed around Steves head, causing him to sight deeply, swift his hand around in a lazy try to scare it away. That was not very effective.  
He moaned loudly and pushed himself up, “I’m gonna go take a shower. Care to join in?” Bucky started at the ceiling, “I’d like to. But I can’t move. Impossible. I tried.” Steve shrugged and walked towards the door, his feet dragging over the floor.  
“Can you check the temperature?”   
It took Steve about a minutes until he replied, “92°F outside, 85°F inside.”  
“Aren’t you supposed to have AC or something?”  
“I have. Just not the good, expensive one.”  
The sound of the shower filled the apartment and Bucky stayed laying down until it stopped again. Waiting for a soaking wet Steve to enter the bedroom again.  
“You are not really, STILL lying here.”  
“What does it look like.”  
“Like you’re a lazy fuck.”  
“It’s hot. Don’t blame me, blame the summer.”  
Steve bowed over Bucky and shook the water out of his hair, causing the brunet to his and curl up under the cold water drops.   
“C’mon.” Steve straightened his back and turned towards his closet, but Bucky took his hand and pulled him into the bed again.   
“No, get away from me. You’re sweaty and I am clean and arg...”, the protest melted under Buckys touch and turned into approving little hums.   
“I thought you couldn’t move?”  
“You want me to stop?”  
Steve shivered and shook his head. He sat with his back towards Bucky, exposing his neck to the soft kisses of the other man. 

“Hello?” The sound of keys dropping on wood crashed the silence around them.

“Shit.” Steve jumped up and got to his drawer to get a pair of clean boxers and walked out, shutting the door to his bedroom behind him.  
Bucky was still sitting on the bed, not really knowing what just happened.  
He heard Steve and Sam talking through the door, “oh hey Sam. Is using the doorbell no longer on your level?” - “Nice underwear. Didn’t think I would ever see the day that Steve Rogers oversleeps.” Silence. “You did oversleep, right?” Silence. “You don’t… have someone here, right?” Silence. Bucky could only imagine the mischievous look on Steves face. “Stop fucking with me. No damn way. Admit to oversleeping already.” - “If you say so.” Bucky grinned.   
He could step out now, but it would be funnier to just come out of the room more casually in a couple minutes. Silently searching for- and slipping into a pair of boxers, he dropped the drugs back into his bag, instead of letting them out in the open and listened closely to Steve and Sam’s conversation.  
As far as he could tell, they were in the making of breakfast and coffee.

He ruffled his hair in the mirror and grinned one last time, before putting on his poker-face, opening the door and walking out – directed towards the bathroom.   
Steve turned his head and smirked, “hey, I was wondering where you were.” Sam just sat there, mouth dropped open – his face changing from shock, to an exorbitantly dirty grin.   
Bucky was already at the bathroom door when he heard him say, “nice work, Rogers.”

Steves grin didn’t disappear, even after Bucky finished his shower, went back to the bedroom, dressed himself, made himself a cup of tea and sat down with them.  
“I’m Bucky, by the way.” Sam shook his hand and replied with his own name.   
Their talk was casual, until Steve scratched the back of his head and decided to enlighten Sam on their ~situation~.

“Sam, I’m sorry for dragging you into something, but we might need your help.” Sam looked at both of them with one eyebrow up. “We know each other for over 5 years now, after all this shit you dragged me into, what could surprise me?” - “We have over 2 pounds of heroin in Steves bedroom.” Bucky jumped in, trying to avoid talking around the elephant in the (bed)room.

Sam just stared at them for a couple seconds, just when Bucky thought he would probably walk out on them, calling the police right after he stepped outside the door.  
But Steves friend surprised him.

“Care to explain?” The question was directed to Bucky, rather than Steve. So he nodded and tried finding the right words to explain it.  
After he had ended, Sam closed his eyes and rubbed his sleeves.

“First of all, Steve, your taste in men is horrible. How come you always fall for people that are either dangerous, are in terrible danger themselves or both. Now second off, Bucky – right? - you don’t have to wait for Natasha to get the info about your Boss. I know someone who can help us out. I’m gonna go and call him right now, he’s at work as far as I know. Third off, Steve please get some clothes on your body, I feel like we’re in some serious business here and you are a) distracting your friend here and b) triggering me to get my sunglasses because your body is tormentingly white.” Steve chewed on his bottom lip and stood up, to walk towards his bedroom.  
Bucky shivered, he was expecting Sam to use them being alone to threaten him, to go away immediately or to tell him that Steve was too good for him (which he was). But Sam just smiled at him with a warm, understanding tone in his eyes. “You are very lucky. Steve is probably one of the 10 people in all of New York that would help you.” Bucky smiled awkwardly, “yeah, I don’t really get why he’s doing this.” Sam shrugged, “that’s just who he is. Always helping others out, always nice and happy to help.” He intensified his stare, “kid has quite a past behind him, but I’ve never seen him being hateful or anything. If he knows you’re innocent – or he at least believes it – he’s got your back. No matter what.” Sam had been leaning himself forward with every word, but snapped back the second Steve re-entered the room.

“Didn’t you say you wanted to call that friend of yours?” Bucky bit the inside of his cheek, as he looked over to Steve. The skinny blonde was dressed in a white button-down and khakis with dark-blue suspenders reaching over his bony shoulders.   
It looked ludicrously good.  
“Yeah, I’m gonna do that.” Sam squeezed Buckys shoulder and left him extremely confused. “What’s wrong?” Steve sat down and looked over to him with a worried look. “Y’all are so nice to me. That’s… weird.” - “Is it?” The blonde shrugged and smiled widely, “for us it’s normal. You didn’t chose this shit, and we might actually be able to help you out.”   
Bucky chewed his bottom lip, “but it’s my fault. I did this to myself and you are under no obligation to help me.”   
Blue eyes observed him and light blond eyebrows rose in sorrow, “you don’t think so? I don’t care how long we know each other, I consider you my friend, maybe even more than that. So yeah, if you need a reason why I’m helping you out – there you go.”  
Bucky smiled.  
“What, why are you smiling at me all of a sudden?”  
He widened his smile, “’maybe even more than that’, you are so adorable.” Steve snapped around and put his hands on his hip, “well yeah I don’t know about you, but since I don’t usually let my friends fuck me senseless on the kitchen counter, I am not so sure if that word fits the bill.”

Bucky covered his mouth with his left hand as he began laughing, pointing over to the kitchen door with his right. Steve got bride red, as he saw Sam standing there, his arms crossed over the chest.  
“Too much information guys. And by the way, the ~kitchen counter~? Gross, Steve, gross.”  
Steve wiped away his bangs, trying not to look, like he was extremely embarrassed. “I cleaned it, what… what about Buckys Boss? You got something?” Sam sat down again, “he’s going to send it over asap. You got your laptop? And by the way, I am never going to trust anything you cook ever again. It this table even safe to sit on?” Steve ignored him and got his laptop. 

While he was away, Bucky leaned over to Sam and grinned, “if I where you, I wouldn’t sit on that chair of yours.”   
Sam squinted his eyes at him and they both began laughing.

“There you go – what’s going on?” The puzzled look on Steves face made it worse. Sam and Bucky couldn’t stop giggling like idiots.

“You know what, I don’t even wanna know. Let’s check your mails.”

Sam’s friend took his time, but when Steve finally opened the mail – about one hour later – all three of them inhaled sharply.   
Brock Rumlow, 7th place on the most wanted list of the US, 13th place in Mexico, 26th place in Canada and 191st place world wide. Searched for in all fifty states and in over forty countries. Second head of one of the most delinquent drug cartels since the 1970s.   
Over 2500 deaths in the last forty years got counted back to that cartel, over a hundred especially to Rumlow – unknown dark number of undetected deaths.  
Human experiments, controlled drug-overdosing, stretching of drugs with really, really bad shit like rock salt or dynamite – causing even more deaths. 

A terrifying lot of numbers.  
A terrifying lot of informations.

Steve patted Buckys back and gave worried looks to Sam, who just sat there staring at the screen.  
“Shit, man. This is bigger than I thought.” Sam cleared his throat, “you should call Natasha asap.” Steve nodded. “Will do. Bucky, just know that we will get your mother out there and get their asses in prison.”   
Bucky couldn’t answer to that. He never even imagines that Brock was more than a low-key drug dealer. If only he’d known…

“Bucky?” Sam looked over to him, seemingly worried, “Natasha is a little harsher. I think it’s better if you are not here when she gets here – and I’m pretty sure she will waste no time if she senses that Steve might be in danger. Do you mind coming with me until we got this sorted out?”

He took his belongings, left the drugs out, and walked out with Sam. Steve kissed him goodbye, which made things better.   
It couldn’t fix their problems, but it made Bucky feel good and welcome and not like an asshole to put them in danger – to put ~Steve~ in danger. 

 

As Steve closed the door, he felt like weights dropped on his shoulders.   
His fingers were shaking as he dialled Natashas number.

Ah yes, Natasha Romanov.  
Beautiful like a sunset, sweet like lemonade, smarter than one would guess – deadly like basically every animal in Australia.   
Natasha Romanov was amazing and Steve loved her, but she was also very stubborn, aggressive at most times and – even though she was the best friend one could hope for – she sometimes could be one hell of a bitch.

Especially when someone lied to her.

It wasn’t like Steve didn’t trust her, no! But it seemed like a bad idea to tell her about Bucky on the phone, so he – well he kind of made up a story that was dramatic enough to get her so go to him asap.  
He tried justifying his lie, as Natasha nearly beat him down for not actually having a terminal illness. 

She however did reacted more civilized, when he told her about Bucky. 

“So you got to know this guy, helped him out because you thought he was a normal idiot and now that.”  
“That about sums it up.”  
“Does Sam know?”  
“Where do you think Bucky is right now.”  
“Of course he knows.” She massaged the bridge of her nose, “you should have called me yesterday.” - “I didn’t knew how bad the situation was.” - “Ah yes, what do you know about him?”   
Steve hesitated telling her everything. So he only told her his name and his reputation.

“Why is he so important to you? You’re taking a huge ass risk here. It’s literally your job to arrest people like him.” Natasha looked at him with a huge question mark on her face.   
Steve searched for words, “he is innocent and gets forced to do shit and his boss is harassing him and-” Natasha cut him off, “you two hooked up right.”

Shit.

“Whaaat? Noooo? How do you-”  
“Don’t lie.”  
“Yeah we did.”  
“When?”  
“Yesterday.”  
“God Steve, he could be dange-”  
“The ~whole~ evening. To be precise.”  
“You are such an idiot. You hooked up with a drug-smuggler. That you literally JUST met. And you never noticed ANYTHING?”  
“No.”  
“No? You are a cop, Steve!”  
“No, no… that’s not what I… I-”  
“Oh god. No.”  
“I… more or less... knew the whole time.”  
“Are you SHITTING ME?”  
“Well, okay to be fair, I only knew after the first half so-”  
“YOU HOOKED UP WITH SOMEONE, DISCOVERED HE IS A SMUGGLER AND THEN HOOKED UP WITH HIM A.G.A.I.N.???”  
“Yeah...”  
“STEVE.”  
“I know. I know. But I swear it to you, he got forced to do that.”  
“I fucking hate you so much.”  
“No you don’t. You love me.”  
“I should have kicked your ass way back in school, damn it.”  
“So you’re helping us?”  
“Fuck you.”  
Steve grinned and pulled her in a hug. “Thanks. I knew I could count on ya.” Natasha pulled a grimace, “if I get fired because of you...” - “Yeah I know. I’m dead. But I think you’re gonna get a promotion after this.” - “Why on earth would they give me a promotion for helping a smuggler?” Steve grinned even wider, “because we are going to take the cartel down, he works for. And that cartel is nothing less than HYDRA.”

Natasha froze.


	4. Planes and plans

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Triggers:  
> \- Explicit Violence: No  
> \- Explicit Sex: No  
> \- Other: Drug talk, language  
> Revised: No

HYDRA was the most wanted drug cartel in the US. They had branches in every state – annoying the shit out of every police department there was. 

No surprise, that the sight of catching one of the heads of HYDRA, gave Natasha a different perspective on things.  
She immediately called in on her boss, informing him about their discovery – leading up to them calling in the FBI and sending Natasha, her boss and two other police officers of the NYPD to Ohio.  
As soon as Natasha had ended her phone call, she looked over to Steve with a look of triumph on her face.

“What’s going on?”  
“Their sending me over, together with Banner – the new chief of our department.”  
Steve tried, not to look jealous, but it felt unfair. He was the one finding the witness, he made the work to figure out who Buckys boss was – and now all he got was a mention in the file and – if he was lucky – a raise or something.  
He rose one of his eyebrows, noticing that Natasha was still grinning at him.  
“Something else?”  
“Sam is coming with us. We need him there – but don’t worry”, she added, seeing that Steves mount dropped open, “we’ll keep him very, very safe.”  
“You don’t know that! He hasn’t been in active duty for moths! What if something happens to him? That would be my fault, and yours and-”  
“I am pretty sure he will be safe.” Natasha cut him off.  
“How do you know that?”  
“Because our department has this new chief, as I already said.”  
“So?”  
“And he had insight on your file.”  
Steve swallowed.  
“And he decided, that you are going to join us.”  
Steve swallowed again. “You mean like...” - “like a second chance for you to get into active duty? Yes, exactly like that.”

There was a minute or two of them just standing there. Natasha observing Steve, waiting for an emotion to show up on his face.   
As he finally ~got~ what this meant – Steve started laughing and hugged Natasha as hard as he could.   
“This is incredible, thank you Natasha!”  
“Don’t blow it, hot shot.” She laughed and ruffled through his short hair.

Steve called in Sam and Bucky. Filling in Sam with the new information, whilst Natasha eyeballed Bucky – who stood still, terrified of the ‘I am going to arrest you if you move’-stare, the redhead could pull off flawlessly.  
“So you’re Bucky, huh?”  
Bucky hummed as an answer.  
“Are you tongue-tied?”  
“No.”  
“Than answer me, boy.”  
“Yes, mam.”  
Natashas mount dropped open.

Sam howled in the background, “ohhhhhhhhhh he mamed you. Prepare your funeral Barnes!” Steve shook his head and laughed, “that’s what you get for torturing him like that.” He walked over to them, pulling his hand around Buckys waist. “Be nice Tasha, he might be your ticked to a promotion and my ticked to get into duty.”  
“What?” Bucky looked shocked, as he turned his head towards the smaller man next to him. “Jup”, Steve grinned, “Tasha talked to her chief, he’s new and willing to give me the chance the old one never did. We’re flying to Ohio this night!” 

Bucky went from a bride smile to a scared look within seconds. “Wait. I’m not coming with you?” Both, Natasha and Steve looked at him like he went crazy. “Of course not. They don’t know who you are right now, and it’s best if it stays like that. It would be nuts to get you into the same state as the people who are going to want you dead in a couple days!” - “You mean they will figure out who brought this to them?” Bucky went white. “Yeah, you should be in New Mexico right now, remember? I don’t think it will take them long to relate you being missing and us taking them out.”  
Bucky nodded, “I want to go with you.” Before any of them could intervene, he held up a hand and gestured for them to let him finish. “I am going with you. They have my mother – I will not sit here waiting for news about her. I have to get there to help her understand what happened – if she… if she survives this.” Steve stroke Buckys arm, but Bucky backed off and continued his speech, “I take the risk. If they want to find me, they will – and I’m pretty sure I am safer in a police department in Ohio, than alone in NYC.”

“But Bucky, you could end up in their force and… I might not be able to protect you from that...”  
Steve looked over to his two friends for back up.

Tasha was the first to respond, “Bucky is right.” Steve inhaled sharply and got himself ready to answer to that but Sam cut him off, “you can’t argue with his logic here, Steve. He will be in the building with 10-20 officers at all times. Man, he just wants to be there for his mom. Of all people, you should get it.”

 

Steve still had a horrible feeling about this, as they passed their gate about 6 hours later. 

It was going to be a two hour flight, not a big deal for any of them. But Steve felt Bucky flinch, as he passed the gate. Natasha had gotten him off the no-flight-list but the fear of not being able to attend this plane sat deep in Buckys bones.  
He would never admit to that, Steve knew so much about him, but Bucky was more than just nervous.

But damn, so was Steve.  
Buckys mother and Bucky himself were at a high risk, but all he could think about was himself.  
This was his chance. His chance of finally getting into active duty. 

God he felt horrible for putting his own wants over the concern for Bucky, but he just couldn’t focus on anything else.

They had seats next to each other, Natasha and Sam seated behind them, Natashas boss and another colleague in front of them.   
Right after they took off, one of the men in front of them turned around as good as he could and smiled at them.  
“Hey, you must be Steve. I’ve heard quite a bit about you by now.”  
Steve felt the heat rise up to his cheeks, “yeah that’s me. I hope she only told you the good stuff.” The man laughed, he was in his forties, the age clearly showing in the creaks around his eyes – yet not changing the fact that he was quite handsome. “Banner”, he stretched out a hand toward Steve, “Bruce Banner.” Steve smiled back and took the offered hand with as much of a firm handshake as he could offer. “Steve Rogers. Pleasure to meet you, sir.” Bruce laughed, “don’t sir me. We’re all a big family in our department, you should get used to that.” He turned back to his seat with a wink and left Steve with an unbelieving smile.   
Bucky grinned nervously and rubbed Steves shoulder.

There was a question, Steve had been eager to ask ever since he knew about Buckys job. Nearly one hour in their flight he couldn’t help but turn to Bucky, whispering: “Hey can I ask you something?” The brunet had his eyes closed, but he nodded. Steve swallowed and continued, “how… how do you usually get the drugs over the border? Been working at the JFK for months now and I never actually caught someone.”  
Bucky faced him with an expression that explained it better than words could.  
“Oh you gotta be shitting me” - “Quite literally.” - “That’s disgusting.”  
Bucky closed his eyes again and shrugged, “you asked, pal.” 

Steve shivered and faced the seat in front of him, trying not to think about Bucky shoving things up his butt. Luckily, someone got that covered for him.  
Natashas head appeared in between them from behind, “please tell me you are not talking about drug smuggling whilst being on a plane.”  
Both of them exchanged a look of guilt and Natasha sighted deeply. “Idiots...”, she murmured, backing off again.

As they landed and climbed out the plane, Steve felt the older man tensing up next to him. “Dude, you will be alright.” Steve tried calming him down. Bucky smiled at him, but it didn’t seem to help.   
Sam and Bruce took off quite quickly, leaving Tasha, her colleague, Steve and Bucky to themselves. The four of them stood in front of the Cleveland-airport, waiting for their cab to come. 

“There we go”, Natasha opened the door and looked around while Steve and Bucky got in in the back. Her colleague tried getting in the front, but Natasha gave her one look at she got in the back together with the other two.   
“Hi, I’m Sharon. Shannon Carter.” The blonde girl smiled at Steve, completely ignoring Bucky in between them. “Hi. Steve Rogers. I-” - “We went to the same school, but I never got to meet you.” She cut him off, blabbering away, leaving Bucky to a knowing smile.   
Natasha looked back, exchanging a dirty look with Bucky, nodding slightly.  
Steve had no clue that Sharon flirted with him, which Bucky found adorable. But he grieved, not being able to get the look on poor Sharons face as he pulled Steve into a kiss.

He heard Natasha snickering in the front. 

Sharon cut off her talking almost immediately, although Steve tried keeping their talk up. He was absolutely clueless, why she seemed pissed all of a sudden, while Natasha and Bucky had a hard time keeping their laughter to themselves.

“Could you move up your seat, Natasha?”   
The redhead grinned into the mirror in front of her, shaking her head. “Nah Sharon, sorry. But we’re almost there anyways.”

As a matter of fact they were actually pretty close to the Cleveland police department. Bucky recognized it about 5 blocks early, getting him to shift uncomfortably in his seat.

“You’re gonna get my mother first, right?” He asked, while they were walking down the clean floor towards the elevator.   
“We have to get her during our operation. If we get her beforehand, it’ll send a warning to them, and we most definitely do not want that.”   
Bucky just nodded and went silent until they met Bruce again. Sam was already talking to the rest of the squad about how to approach all of this without taking huge risks and Steve could feel the tension rise in all of them, as it got real.  
Bucky pointed out all he knew about HYDRA’s nests and got send into the surveillance room, together with around 10 other cops. 

It was about 1am, when the teams got made – Steve, Natasha, Bruce and two other agents would get into the main nest while Sharon, Sam and – again – two other cops, would head over to Buckys house to get his mother.   
Bucky felt like a child, as they left him alone with one cop – way too young for Bucky to take seriously as a babysitter. Steve pulled him into a kiss, right before he got his skinny ass into his brand new uniform and out of the building.

The next minutes were filled with the sound of driving cars through the radio and the jokes Natasha and Steve told each other to loosen up.  
Bucky held his breath and leaned forward, as he heard Steve whispering “let’s go. Sam, any of em around the house of our witness?” The radio made a sharp, high noise, before letting Sam’s voice through to them. “Yeah, one guy in a car.” Silence. Than Steve. “Wait until we’re in. Take him out, do not let him send them a warning.”

Buckys babysitter got up to get something to drink, leaving Bucky with the others – just as the radio cracked again.   
It was Natasha, “we’re in.” 

After that, there were no more messages for about ten minutes.  
Ten horrible minutes that nearly drove Bucky insane.  
He felt incredibly guilty.  
So damn guilty.

“We have the guy in the car, no sign that he informed the others. We’re getting in the house now.”   
The next moments turned Bucky into a shaking individual, barely able to breath, as he waited upon the fate of his mother.  
What if they already killed her as soon as he didn’t turn up in New Mexico?  
No, they probably figured out that he got stuck somewhere, right?  
Oh god, what if they took her to punish him.  
The radio cracked and Bucky jumped up, “shit, fucking shit.” Sam’s voice sounded serious, “she’s not here. We searched every room.” The following silence allowed everyone in the room to get nervous, Bucky felt tears rushing to his eyes. They took her. It was all his fault. 

“Repeat please.” One of the officers in the room answered to Sam, having everyone gather around the machine.  
“She’s not in the house. We’re trying to get information on where she is. Purse and cellphone are both gone – no sight of a forced entry. She might be just out in town.” The officer on the radio turned to Bucky, “she got a boyfriend? A bar she always goes to? Anything like that?” Buckys head was spinning, but he remembered something.   
“Yes”, his voice was breathless, “yes she got a boyfriend. 77831 Cloverlane – it’s about ten minutes from her house.” The officer repeated the information to Sam and sqeezed Buckys shoulder.   
“It’s gonna be alright, kid.”  
Bucky nearly laughed out loud. At least someone in this room still had hope.

There was nothing from Steve or Natasha or Bruce – they probably had bigger problems right now than Buckys mom.  
It still felt weird.  
Was everything going to shit now?

Another fifteen minutes passed until they heard Sam through the radio, talking at a normal volume, “she’s here. We got her.” Bucky nearly cried.

She was safe.

His mom was safe.

Nothing else mattered.

He tapped the shoulder of his babysitter-cop, “hey man, I need a cig.” The cop looked around nervously, but nodded. “Go.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey!
> 
> Thank y'all for 500 views! I feel so accomplished by this :D  
> Anyways the next couple chapters are going to be full of action, so look forward to that!
> 
> Comments and Kudos are very much appreciated!


	5. Final shot

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Triggers:  
> \- Explicit Violence: Slight (as well as blood)  
> \- Explicit Sex: No  
> \- Other: Language  
> Revised: No

He panted lightly, sweat dripping from his forehead, as he and Natasha moved towards the warehouse. 

Normally, a drug bust was nothing special, it happened quite often. But normally, those drug busts were about small branches, little cookers – Breaking Bad season one stuff.  
This could become one of the most important drug busts in modern history.  
And he could fuck it all up.

Steve was so damn nervous.

His earpiece crackled and made him pull a face towards Natasha – who gave him an apologetic look, turning down the volume on the radio.   
He looked up to the roof – scanning for snipers or guards, Natasha gestured towards Bruce and both of them began walking around the building from different directions. One of the other agents squatted next to Steve in the shadow and gave him a heads up, “you okay, kid?” - “Yeah, a little shaky, but that’s alright.” - “Must be scary, huh? I remember my first real operation was not even close to this big – and I wasn’t out of the job for as long as you were.” Great. Thanks for that. Steve smiled insecurely. “Oh shit. I mean. No. Ehm. What, what I meant was: You gonna rock this. Okay?” The man was about as old as Bruce, maybe a little older, and looked like he’s been on the job for quite some time now. “I’m Coulson. Phil.” Steve nodded over and smiled again, this time a little wider, “Steve Rogers. I am super nervous, but also happy. Fury, the former chief of the department, kicked me out without any real reason. So mostly I’m just happy to be back in business.” Coulson nodded, “yeah I read about that.”   
Their talk paused as soon as Natasha sprinted to them with a tense look on her face, “all clear. Bruce is taking out the last of the guards right now, he should join us...” - “right about now.” Bruce had snug up on them and gestured them to follow him.

Steve and Natasha fell behind as the skinny blonde took her arm, “we should check in with the other team.” She nodded, “true.”   
Taking a deep breath, he held his mic on his wrist towards his mouth and began whispering. “Let’s go. Sam, any of em around the house of”, he hesitated, “our witness?” It took Sam about half a minute to respond, yeah, one guy in a car.” Steve looked over to Natasha and felt Bruce staring at him together with Coulson and the other agent. Steve hadn’t met her, but she looked intense. Brown ponytail, a sharp face, light eyes – extremely pretty with a stunning similarity to Robin from How I met your mother.  
Maria Hill. Natasha had told him her name in the car.  
He would love to chat with her once this was over, from what he’d heard – she and Coulson were extremely fascinating agents.  
He checked in with Tasha and started talking back to the little apparatus around his wrist, “wait until we’re in. Take him out, do not let him send them a warning.”

After that, they all nodded towards each other and continued sneaking to the warehouse. The main door was open, but the room behind that had two doors, on of them secured with multiple padlocks, the other one open. “Clear.” Natasha whispered into their ears as she opened the unsecured door. All of them had changed their mics to a private frequency. “No cameras in the room… wait”, Coulsons voice cracked lightly through the radio, “one right above the locked door, look out M.” Maria had been sneaking up on the padlocks and hissed away from them, as soon as she hear Coulsons update. Steve, eager to actually help them, gestured towards her and crouched to the camera, opening up the case, swirling around two of the wires. It should show a frozen frame now.   
He gave Maria a thumbs up and watched her opening the locks in supersonic speed.

It clicked and Maria skulked inside, immediately followed by Coulson and Natasha, while Bruce and Steve stayed outside, guns in their hands, waiting for one of the three to give notice.  
“We’re in.” Natashas voice rushed through the frequency that the other team and the police department could hear as well. Bruce nodded over to Steve and followed him into the complete darkness behind the door, that swallowed them whole.

The warehouse looked old and disgusting on the outside and to be fair, the insides looked just like that. But the cartel had left behind several clues for the team to find.   
New padlocks on the door were only one of them.

They cleared out most of the building in minutes and Steve almost feared, that the cartel had cleaned up after Bucky didn’t arrive in New Mexico. But right when he walked in the last room, whispering clear into his mic, someone else interfered with his voice. It was Bruce, repeatedly calling them to his position.  
As he arrived, Steve saw the hatch. Polished, new metal, glistering in the little light coming through the crack in the papers, that were glued on the windows.  
Coulson gave it a closer look and opened it with Marias help. They proceeded similar to the door before, Steve and Bruce following the others after Natasha gave them the ‘go’.

All of a sudden the walls and the floor were brand new and made out of metal, which caused them to make hallow sounds as the five officers walked on them.   
They entered a long hallway without doors, until they came to it’s end.   
“Shit, fucking shit.”  
The earpieces of all the them summed and they exchanged shocked looks. Steve recognized Sams voice and clawed his hands to tight fists. “She’s not here. We searched every room.” Maria sighted relieved and wanted to proceed forward, but Bruce and Natasha gave worried looks to Steve – who had gone completely white.

“Do you want to step out?” Bruce asked truly worried, but Steve shook hi head and ripped his earpiece out. “Let’s find her.”   
“Steve you might need that”, Natasha rose her eyebrows on him. “They are going to talk. And when I hear his voice, I won’t be able to focus. I can’t hear his fear, Tasha. I just can’t.” He pushed himself forward and left her behind, the earpiece in his pocket. 

Maria had already opened the next door and gave him a long look, as he walked up to her. The room behind that door was well lit, gigantic and for the first time since they’ve entered, they could see people.  
Two guys in lab coats, walking around about 20 feet below. The door had led them to an industrial grid floor with two staircases leading down to some sort of lab. The upper floor lead once around the corners of the room, allowing the agents and officers to separate and observe from different points. 

Natasha screamed artificially, letting all of their blood freeze, and as soon as Steve turned toward the direction of the sound he saw why. A man, not dressed in a lab coat, had managed to sneak up on her as she had crouched down the staircase, holding a gun to her sleeve, whispering something in her ear.   
He must’ve told her to scream, otherwise the trained woman would have never gave away a sound like that.   
The two guys in the middle of the room ducked, as Coulson gave away a gunshot towards the gas-pipe behind Natasha and her tormentor. The leaking smog gave them cover and allowed Steve to get closer, jumping down the stair – positioning himself angled behind them. He ducked behind a container and watched Maria and Bruce coming closer as well – but they were too far away.   
The man had recovered, backing away with Natasha in his force. Steve had to do something. Now!

Blood rushed through his head, making him feel dizzy, as he rose up the gun, trying not to breath in the gas – who knew what on earth that was.   
He squinted his eyes, raising his gun as soon as he got a halfway clear view to Natasha, who struggled not fighting against the gun on her head.   
“Keep still you bitch!” The man was not Rumlow, Steve couldn’t get a good look on his face, but he could see it well enough to know that.  
On the edge of a panic, Steve observes Coulson running towards them, getting the man to raise his gun towards him, what gave Natasha the perfect opportunity to fight back without getting shot immediately.  
She kicked back, flipped the guy over a stepped on the hand with the gun in it, until the man let go of it. Coulson arrived helping her to get that guy up and into their force, while Maria chained the to lab-workers onto their own machines, asking them harshly what gas they all were breathing in.

Where in seven hells was Bruce?

Steve blinked a couple times, trying to focus on all the people in the room until he could make out a shadow behind one of the tanks. He snug closer, seeing Bruce getting strangled by another guy. Without hesitating, Steve rose his gun and shot.

Adrenalin rushed through his blood, he heard Maria shouting towards Natasha as both of them came running towards Steve. But he just waved them away and gestured towards Bruce.   
The head of the operation was still lying down, blood all over his face and upper body, the body of the man who strangled him on top of him.  
Natasha helped him to sit up, while Maria searched the body for weapons and Coulson chained Natashas attacker to the two lab-guys, before heading over to Steve, taking his gun out of the shaking hands.   
“Is Bruce alright?” Steve panted and began walking over to his boss. “Steve”, Natasha gave him a shocked look, “how did you knew he was back here?” - “If you wouldn’t have found him he would be dead.” Maria gave him an approving look and patted Bruces back – the man was still coughing and gasping for air. 

Steve just watched them, not responding.   
He just killed someone. 

He got his gun back from Coulson, after reassuring him that he was alright, and began searching for other people or doors. 

They found two more labs.

As far as it seemed, this warehouse was one of the buildings where the cartel made it’s drugs. The man Steve had killed was one of Rumlows guys, but even after they’s gathered all the people in the labs – Rumlow was none of them.

“Rumlow must’ve known that we would come. He has her. He fucking has her. Oh god, this is all my fault, we HAVE to find her!”  
“Steve, Steve calm down. They got her. She’s not with Rumlow!” Natasha squeezed Steves shoulder and looked him in the eyes. He gave out a more than relieved breath and frowned at her, “we still gotta find Rumlow.” - “You should get to Bucky. We’ll swipe the building as soon as back-up is here.”

As Steve walked out of the warehouse, he saw the requested back-up heading towards the building, as well as an ambulance for Bruce.  
Leaving all of this behind, he got into a car and drove to the station. He needed to see that Bucky and his mother were alright.

 

Pulling in the driveway, Steve already felt the relieve mixing with the shock from before. He literally just killed someone – it sure was normal to feel this way.  
He walked in on two guys high-fiving each other, a radio giving away the information that nobody was seriously harmed except for the one dead guy and Bruce – who should be fine.  
The policeman they left Bucky with chatted with two other guys and smiled at Steve, “hey man. We heard the news, you’re some kind of superhero!” Steve gave him a tense smile – he didn’t see what was that great about killing someone - “the other team back yet?” The guy nodded, “yeah, got the mother in room 5. Your friend Sam is over there and the hot chick got out to get the mother some clothes.” Steve gave Sam a nod and looked around, tension crawling up his sleeve. “Is Bucky with his mom?” - “Who? Oh, the guy I should watch? Nah, he’s out smoking.”

Something in Steve cracked.

He tried staying calm, instead of shaking the idiot in front of him senseless. “You let him outside? Alone?” - “Yeah, but it’s alright. You got all the bad guys, right?” Steve walked up to him real close, seeing Sam heading over from the corner of his eyes, “we just took out one of approximately 2000 nests in the States alone and you let out key witness out alone, at night?”   
Sam took over and looked shocked towards them, “wait what?” - “Man, he’s just smoking! He’ll be back in no time!” - “Since when is he out?” Sams voice sounded sick. “I dunno. A couple minutes?” - “Did he left before we came back?” - “Yeah.” Sam sighted deep and grabbed Steve tight, “Steve, stay calm okay.” - “How long have you been back, Sam?” Steve fought back tears, waiting anxiously for a reply.

“About half an hour.”

Steve didn’t snap right after that. It took him a couple seconds to get what was happening, before he started shouting, “Bucky? Had someone seen him?” He got himself out of Sams grip and stormed out, half of the department looking after him with a confused look. 

Sam rose his hands and started explaining.

 

*

 

Bucky inhaled the smoke deeply.

His brain wrapped itself around the fact that his mother was alright. If only Steve turned out to be fine as well.  
He leaned himself to the outside wall of the police department, rolling his head into his neck, he licked over his dry lips and tried, not imagining in what danger the little cop could be right now.  
If only Rumlow didn’t got to him.

Oh god.

Bucky snapped back up and inhaled a second time.  
He would feel much better once he knew his mother was completely safe.   
The night was warm and he felt weird, standing in a city so close to his home town. How often he had been here for visit? How often had he been here because friends of him lived here, or because he had a job to do?  
He wondered how many of his old school friends still lived here. Time sure as hell flew by and he had nothing achieved so far. What would he do, once he was free of the cartel?  
Would Steve stick with him?  
Just as he was about to abandon this depressing thought and get back inside, he head a familiar voice.

No.

Bucky turned around and looked up to his biggest nightmare.


	6. The dreadful cigarette

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Triggers:  
> \- Explicit Violence: Yes  
> \- Explicit Sex: No  
> \- Other: Language  
> Revised: No

“Hey James.”

Silence.

“What you’re not even going to talk to me, now?”

This was exactly Brock Rumlow’s humour. Bucky had something he assumed to be a cloth stuffed into his mouth, making it hard to breath and impossible to speak.  
His hands were tied up over his head, leaving his complete upper body vulnerable and exposed. At least they didn’t hang him up on his hands, Bucky’s feet had to reach for the bottom, but he could support himself enough to prevent his shoulders from getting dislocated or worse.  
The walls around him seemed to be made from metal, with dark patterns of rust crawling up and down like insects.  
He wondered where he was and how they got him here. Even though he had been out smoking alone, he still had been in front of a police station.

Brock’s voice called Bucky back to the chamber. “Bucky, we have a problem. I always liked you, you know that, right? You’ve always been a good kid. Little to no questions, always trustworthy – I even made you a full member of our circle! But Bucky, James, you are now old enough to know that what you do will have consequences!”  
He circled around the prisoner and shook his head.  
“Man, you really put me in a position neither of us is going to like. I have to take actions here!”

As fucking if.  
Brock had always been a fucktard.

The older man looked right into Bucky’s eyes and smiled almost sadly before he continued his speech.  
“First”, he slapped his hand on Bucky’s arm, “you get yourself caught. Then, you talk to your little police-friends and figure out a deal for yourself. Completely forgetting”, Brock pulled out a knife and Bucky’s eyed widened, “all the people in need of this organisation. Which is kind of weird you know, thinking about how you and your mom once needed us as well.” Brock loosely let the knife scratch over the skin of his victim. Not hard enough to hurt or even leave marks, but Bucky still shivered.

“You know, one of our guys got shot. Rivelli, you knew him, right? Some small little blonde man – if you dare call him that – shot him. A bit of a joke for a police man if you ask me. But he will get what he deserves when they find the clue I left behind.”  
Everything in his body tensed up.  
“Oh, yeah. You heard correctly. I left a little present for them, and when they find it and go after us – I will make damn sure they will be greeted with the same amount of respect that they gave to us. Shame, really. One gorgeous red head is with them, but if I recall correctly, you’d probably go for the little blonde guy. Or was it both? Not that I really care about that, they soon will be dead anyways!”

Bucky bit on the cloth and tried not getting his emotions to show on his face.  
He tried so hard.  
But when Brock came back to his front, the knife still scratching over his arms and chest, he immediately began forming a very dirty grin.  
“You know them.”  
He took the cloth out of Bucky’s mouth. “Which one do you know?” - “As if I would tell you that.” Bucky spit the words out. “Of course you’re going to tell me. Or I will make damn sure that I cut off everything”, Brock let the knife drop towards Bucky’s crotch, “down there.”  
He rose one eyebrow and squinted his eyes. “Is it the girl?” Bucky bit the inside of his cheek, “or the guy...” His former boss grinned wider, “the guy.”

Bucky panicked, “you want to kill both so why does it matter? A little risky to ungag me for that, huh?” - “Oh, I didn’t just ungag you for that. I ungagged you so that I could hear you scream!” He rammed the knife into Bucky’s waist – with enough knowledge to not actually put him in danger, but to hurt him very, very badly.  
Bucky screamed and turned his head towards his own arm, sobbing with his nose on his biceps and his eyes closed.  
Brock laughed and placed a small little cut on Bucky’s ribcage and another one, right above his belly button. His victim stopped breathing and just cried silently with his mouth dropped open and his eyes squinted against the tied-up arm.  
“You left us, Bucky. You left me, after everything I’ve done for you. I gave you a life, I gave you a purpose and a job! You are so ungrateful. So now I will make sure, that wherever you go, you will always think of me.” Brock untied one of Bucky’s arms, but the man didn’t have the strength to fight him. He let out a series of screams, high so full of emotions, they could burst the brain of any man or women nearby, that wasn’t already insane.  
His tormentor had carved a star on the outside of Bucky’s left arm, finishing it up with a shaky circle around it and – that sick fuck – his own name under that.   
“Hold still, Bucky. You don’t want that to look good?”  
But Bucky was so close to passing out, he barely even held his eyes open. The screams had lost all volume and reminded him more of the sound of crying.

When Brock was finished, he smiled proudly and tied Bucky up again – something that left his arm in a position to constantly rub against his face. Blood streamed down the arm and onto Bucky’s face, neck and chest.  
There was so much blood.

“One last thing, Bucky.” His former boss leaned his face next to Bucky’s and whispered into his ear, “your little friend, the cute blonde one, I will make sure my men won’t kill him. Oh no. We will fly him to Mexico and I will personally sell him to the cheapest, most brutal circle of human trafficking I can find. Those guys really have it in for such small, delicately framed men.”  
With these words he left Bucky hanging and opened the door, to get out.

 

*

 

It had been four hours.  
Steve sat on eggshells and couldn’t focus on anything else than Bucky being missing.

It was all his fault.

If Bucky would get hurt or worse, it would be Steve’s fault.

He jumped up as he felt Natasha’s hand on his shoulder. “Steve? We got something.” He followed his friend and sat down next to Sam, who put his arm around him in an effort to comfort his friend.

“Careful”, Natasha stopped at a door. A dark figure was visibly moving behind the milky glass. “I don’t know how dangerous he is like this.” The door opened, and Steve sucked in a hard breath. The man in front of him was handsome. He had a smug grin on his face, a square jaw and dark eyes, piercing everyone of them.

“Is that…” Steve looked over to Natasha, who eyeballed the man thoroughly. “Most likely not. He seems like a distraction. One of the front guys, designed to catch the bullet for his boss. They probably look alike.” He nodded. She was right, but still. “This guy might know something.” – “You’re right”, his friend rolled up her sleeves, “that’s why you need to get outta here. I’d like some alone-time with our buddy here.”

It didn’t even take her half an hour to get seven more locations. Seven more places for them to raid. Well, for everyone but Steve.

“You can’t be serious!” His little heart was pumping like crazy. He almost didn’t hear the response over the sound of blood rushing in his ears. “Steve, it would be crazy to let you in on this. You are clearly too emotional, let alone the massive conflict of interest this is!” His supervisor put his hand on Steves shoulder, “sorry man. Nothing I can do. It’s for the better when you’re here anyways. Turn out they found a shit ton of paperwork in the lab for us to check out.”

Steve sighed. Back to paperwork. It had always been desk or airport for him. Of course it would not be any different now. Coulson picked up on Steve’s behaviour. “Hey, you keep yourself busy until we find him, okay?”

They left shortly after, leaving Steve behind. He wanted to punch a wall or something. People on Tv always did that, when they were frustrated. But then again he’d probably break his hand before he would even put a scratch on a wall.

He walked past the room with the witness Natasha had a ‘talk’ with and stopped. He couldn’t punch a wall, but he could do something else.

“Hey”, Steve sat down on the other side of the table. The guy looked rough, but he met his eyes. “Don’t worry, I’m not going to hurt you.” The small smile on the other mans face stung a little, but Steve put the thought aside. He could feel self-conscious again, when all of this was over.

“Right”, he chuckled, “you don’t think I’m capable of hurting you. I get that. But, you see, I’m not one to hurt people with violence. I’m an excellent interrogator.” It wasn’t technically a lie. He had interrogated people for the airport.

“You look like a twelve-year-old boy. No offence.” – “None taken.” He swallowed his pride and looked at the man in front of him. Even with the fresh bruises he looked handsome. But there was something off about him. “Why are you doing this? Taking the blame for someone like your boss and for what? Money?” He rose an eyebrow, “or does he got leverage on you? No, nothing could be worse that what you would go down for. Not to mention the fact that your boss knew that we’d figure out this little trick. You’re clearly not smart enough to run a cartel like HYDRA.”

Nothing. Pride was not the door to this guys tongue. 

“Or”, he scanned the mans face. He had a good poker-face, but there was something luring under there. “Or he has someone you care about. It seems to be his kind of thing anyways. He just takes the people close to you and forces you to do his dirty laundry. That’s it, right? Tell me, who’s the one that he’s got? Your mother, father, brother, sister, wife?” The man looked up. “What’s your name, boy?”

Boy? Really? Hell, if this was over he really had to hit the gym more. 

“I’ll tell you mine if you tell me yours.” The man scoffed, but he looked right into Steve’s eyes and said “Henry.” – “Well Henry my name is Steve and I really want to help you out here.” – “I doubt you can.” – “Tell me who he got and I will do what I can.” Henry inspected the floor. “If I tell you he’ll kill them.” So there was more than one victim. That was something. “I’ve played this game before, Henry. What do you think will happen to them even if you stay quiet? You’re in here, your boss knows that. Doesn’t look good either way for you.” – “I know.”

He sighed, “Henry please. I’m stuck here, same as you and I just want to do something better than damn paper-work, okay? I really just want to help you.” – “You can’t! Sorry to give you the news bud, but I’m screwed and so is everyone I love, okay? I fucked up. Royally. They’re all good as dead and it’s my fucking fault. You don’t know what by boss is capable of. The second he’ll figure out I gave that info to the redhead, he’ll shoot them or worse.” – “Look potty-mouth, you say their already screwed. What’s the harm in telling me what you know?” – “I… Steve you seem like a really nice guy. But you don’t know what you’re getting yourself into here. He does not mess around. You wanna know what he told me before letting his guys drop me off? He told me to give the cops some shitty information until they trust me and then ask for – surprise – you.”

“What?” Steve had literally no clue what was going in. But he was intrigued. 

“You heard me. Unless you got another scrawny blonde cop who’s name is Steve, I got told to ask for you. But I fucked up. I sat there, under the eyes of your colleague and thought ‘fuck this guy’. I told her everything I knew and now I’m knee deep in shit and you’re in here and” – “What did he tell you do tell me?” Steve was shaking but he tried to hide it. “It’s shit, man. A trap or something. I’m supposed to tell you to go to the old tavern at Marlins-market in downtown. It’s shut down and so obviously a trap, nobody would ever fall for that bullshit.”

Marlins-market. He knew the place. His mother liked going there back when it was still open. 

“Who is it, that he uses against you, Henry? Just tell me.” – “Are you suicidal?” – “No. I’m a fucking cop who just wants to help damnit!” – “He’s got my two nieces. Five and Seven. But to spare you the trouble, they’re probably already dead.” – “You waist this chance because of a ‘probably’. Fucking hell man.” – “Who’s the potty-mouth now?” Steve stood up, chair shrieking behind him. “Just tell me their fucking names.”

 

*

 

Jacob had been a cop for only three weeks, when he got called in to help with the cartel-bust. It was amazing. Just the paperwork alone was enough to keep him happy. But when another cop told him to check two names he felt more important than he ever did before. 

The little blonde cop hopped around him for a couple on minutes, before delegating the search for the two people and running out the door.

Not even five minutes after he’d gone, Jacob heard screams. “Oh my god!” – “Someone call a doctor!” He peeked and got a look at two police officers and one of the helpers gather around someone. Hesitating, he stood up and gave into his curiosity. Just as he squeezed himself through the viewers he saw one of their key witnesses – the guy who’d disappeared earlier, Jack or James or something – being help up by two cops. Blood was streaming over several parts of his body. When they turned him around Jacob couldn’t help but gasp loudly.

“My god, what have they done to you?” His eyes were locked to the arm of the man. The muscles under the wound moved and shifted the loose skin around and before Jacob could help himself, everything went dark.

 

*

 

He’d been to downtown plenty of times. It had always been for pleasure. Visiting friends, trying out restaurants with Nat and Penny.

No!

Stop thinking about Penny, Rogers. 

He pulled over about two blocks from the building. Rumlow knew already that he was coming, but still – one could never be too careful. Steve started walking and thought about how stupid this was. He was walking right into the lions-den without back-up. Nobody even knew he was here. It was suicide. But then again, Rumlow knew about him. He wanted him to come here. The question was why?

He snuck into the dark building. It wasn’t hard, the doors were unlocked. Remembering what he learned last time, he searched for new parts in the old building. Something shiny maybe. But there was nothing. He was about to give up when he noticed a bookshelf. That was odd. This place was almost completely empty, except for rat faeces and rotting wood. An empty, antique-looking piece of furniture was out of place.

All of his body protested when he tried moving it. But it was all worth it, when the metal door showed up. “Finally”, he gasped, trying to catch his breath. The smell of chemicals burned his nose when he opened the door. It was dark. Really dark. The only sounds were his breath and the dripping of water somewhere below. Steve followed a narrow path until he reached a ladder. A dim light stemmed from the caged lanterns on both sides of the corridor.

The sound of footsteps in the distance made him perk up. He hid in one of the passageways to the left and waited. A guard passed him, not even looking in his direction. The man was lightly humming some song, his feet sloping over the ground. 

Steve took the heavy flashlight in his hand and snuck up behind him to knock him out. “Sorry, so so sorry”, he whispered and dragged the man in the other, less well-lit hallway. Steve stood over the guard, looking at the unconscious man. 

“What I’m gonna do now is so not gonna be pleasant for either of us.”

A few minutes later Steve was fully dressed in the uniform of the guard. The poor man was tied up and in his underwear. 

‘I am alone in a creepy-ass corridor walking into a trap I was told is here, dressed as the guard that I knocked out. Why am I such a fucking idiot?’ He cursed at himself for coming here alone. Is was cold and he felt in over his head. Correction. He WAS in over his head. Some blood on a wall made him snap back to reality.

Great. Blood. That wasn’t a bad sign at all.

He turned his back on the wall, following the blood-trail with both directions in sight. The smell of drying blood was overwhelming. Like iron and old socks and stinky cheese all combined to a cocktail of death. But he couldn’t let that get to himself. He had a mission.

A couple of doors appeared in front of him. He took one final look behind him before checking if they were open. Only one of them was smeared with blood. And – surprise – that was the only one who opened. 

What he saw made his blood freeze. 

It wasn’t Bucky, so that was shit. But that poor soul looked like he was closer to death than life. He was hanging, both arms chained to the ceiling. “Damn. Man I’m gonna get you outta here, okay?” He tried freeing the man. To his surprise, he was met with rejection. “Why are you fighting me?” He dodged one of the legs kicking after him. “Oh right, wait”, Steve noticed he was still wearing the costume, “I’m not a guard. For the love of god, will you please stop kicking me?”

It worked. The man seemed to mistrust him, but he held still. Steve noticed, that he looked just like the guy at the station. He must be another one of the doubles. Beaten up really bad, looking like hell itself. There were cuts, bruises and blood. Just so much blood. 

“I got you, man. What’s your name? Can you talk?” He tried helping the man stand, but almost collapsed under that dead weight. “Okay, sit down, c’mon.” The man shook his head frantically, “n…no we don’t have the time. He’ll… he’ll be back s… soon.” – “Okay. Okay. We’ll go. Can you walk?” They slowly got out the door and made their way back up. 

Why did he find this guy? What did Rumlow send him here? 

A little voice in the back of his head told him to abandon the guy he found and go back to look for Bucky. He tried ignoring it so hard. He was a cop and no matter what his boss thought, he would not let his emotions get the better of him. So he walked and walked and walked. The corridor seemed endless now and he felt his strength vanish with every step. 

He didn’t look up until he heard the voices. It was three of them. And he was at his end. No way of fighting them, no way to disappear. The man next to him was breathing heavily. “And who do we got here?” One of the guards that caught them smiling through his teeth. “Sorry to disappoint you guys, but I’m really not up to a fight.” Steve almost fell over when the man who was leaning on him put more weight on him.

A gunshot undermined whatever answer he was going to get. Steve’s tired eyes were barely able to follow what happened next. When he blinked all of the men were down and Natasha was standing in front of him. “Hey Nat.” – “You are a fucking idiot.” – “Can we focus on helping this guy here?” – “If I wouldn’t have come back in between missions I would have never found you.” – “Seriously Nat, can you scream at me later?” – “This fucking screams trap and what does Mr. Steve good guy Rogers do? Go here anyways!” – “Nat, I can’t hold him up any longer.” – “You little nerd if we get out here- oh shit.”

He dropped down, his legs finally giving up under all the weight. He saw Natasha leap over and then something weird happened. The guy who had been leaning on him for all this time started moving. He got up on his feet, pulling a knife out, quickly attacking Natasha. When Steve hit the ground, they were fighting. When he got himself back on his feet, they were still at it. Grunting and hitting their forearms against each other to get a hold of the knife. When Steve pressed his back against the metal wall, Natasha won and hit him with the back of the knife. When Steve wanted to get over there, the man rolled over, pulling a gun out of his pants. When Steve tried backing off, he fired.


End file.
